This research project is investigating whether engagement with science improves when innovation and creativity is at the heart of informal science learning. In order to test this, Durham University researchers are working with practitioners from the Centre for Life and with designers to form a multi-disciplinary team to co-produce exhibits, which enhance creativity, innovation and scientific thinking. Together, using a participatory action approach (PAR), we have iteratively developed a new exhibit pod – specifically to encourage creativity and innovation, and to allow the research team to measure it. The exhibit pod hosting the experiments is on the floor in the Brain Zone, a new gallery at the Centre.

QRator was a collaborative project between the Centre for Digital Humanities (UCLDH), UCL Centre for Advanced Spatial Analysis (CASA), and UCL Museums and Public Engagment, to develop new kinds of content, co-curated by the public, museum curators, and academic researchers, to enhance museum interpretation, community engagement and establish new connections to museum exhibit content. Supported by the UCL Public Engagement Unit.

The Social Interpretation project with the Imperial War Museums, Knowledge Integration and Gooii. The Social Interpretation project was a Research and Development exercise joint funded by the NESTA / Arts Council / AHRC digital R&D Fund, and Imperial War Museums (IWM). At its heart, it aimed to bring successful social interactions already found online and apply them across IWM’s collections – making social objects out of museums objects.

Seven artists have taken inspiration from Tyne & Wear Archives & Museums collections to create artworks and performances which examine and interpret Tyne and Wear in the First World War in innovative ways. From recreated soundscapes of civic life to a reinvention of communications technologies.